Just Jack
by Kate McCaye
Summary: Bored at the Pentagon, Jack misses the rest of the gang, then gets a call from someone who misses him too. Ch 2: Post Ripple Effect.SPOILERS.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Just Jack

Author: Kate McCaye

Rating: K

Category: Humor

Setting: Season 9, anytime during or after Beachhead

Summary: Bored at the Pentagon, Jack misses the rest of the gang, then gets a call from someone who misses him too. Hints at S/J consistent with the show's hints.

A/N: This one is pretty weird. It's also very short and has no point, other than to make you chuckle a little. I'll just keep dipping into my folder of not-so-good stories until the objections become louder than the requests to keep it up;). I couldn't think of a title either, and Will and Grace is on as I post this, so... enjoy. This one's more old-school, like my earliest ones. It's sort of similar to "The Walls Have Ears," I suppose.

Just Jack

Major General Jack O'Neill swallowed down some aspirin with the dregs of coffee at the bottom of his mug. Wincing at the unpleasant flavor, he set the coffee mug down on top of the file he had just completed as though it had mortally offended him.

You'd think the Pentagon, with its vast resources, would be able to make decent coffee. You'd be wrong. Then again, it was possible Jack had just got way too used to Daniel's super-strength coffee over the years, so anything else seemed watery and gross. Either way, "no decent coffee" was Number 12 on the list of things he hated about his new job.

His grumpier-than-usual mood was lifted by the coffee mug itself as he leaned back in his chair and studied it. It was a simple enough mug, just plain white. On the side of it, in black block letters, it said, "THE MAN." It was a gift from SG-1 when he had been promoted to Brigadier General over a year ago, sort of an inside joke between them after he told them he didn't think he could go from "sticking it to the man" to "being the man."

While the team had presented him with the mug, along with a big delicious cake, lots of beer, a stress ball, and an ergonomic pen for all the paperwork he'd have to sign, so the gift was_ technically_ from all of them, he certainly knew them well enough to know whose idea the mug had been. Only Carter's sense of humor would have thought of that.

Jack was fairly certain the pen had been Daniel's idea, and the stress ball had Teal'c written all over it. Not literally of course. Actually, just last week Jack had doodled a picture of the shrub trying to cut the budget of the SGC on one side of the squishy balloon-like ball with a Sharpie. He liked to think it gave him the incentive to squeeze it that much harder.

Regardless, looking at the mug reminded him fondly of his team, which brought a small smile to his face and made the painfully bunched muscles of his shoulders relax just a bit. Or… maybe the aspirin was starting to work. But he was pretty sure it was his team… especially his coffee-mug-giving former 2IC, with whom he had engaged in a truly juvenile phone debate about who missed whom the most, just last night. The conversation had been ended shortly after he overheard Cassie making loud vomiting noises in the background.

He glanced at his desk calendar, his eyes automatically going to the next weekend block with a happy face drawn on it. Three more days… and he still had to finish his weight in paperwork first. He scooted back up to his desk and got back to work resignedly.

The phone rang a few minutes later, and he snatched it up when he saw on the display that it was from the SGC, setting his pen down and resting his chin in his hand as he set the phone to his ear. "O'Neill."

"_Hi, sir. I hope this isn't a bad time…" _

"It's never a bad time for you. What's up?"

There was a heavy sigh on the other end of the phone, and Jack knew it was going to be one of _those _conversations.

"_I miss you, sir." _

"Seems I'm a popular fellow."

"_It's just not the same here anymore. Everyone misses you, but it's especially hard for me considering the… unique relationship we developed over the last year." _

"Yeah. I miss you too, there's nobody here remotely as good as you."

"_Likewise, sir. Now that we're thousands of miles apart I'm not afraid to admit this, but… well, I wasn't exactly the most positive voice in the room when your promotion was announced…" _

"I seem to remember that being the case. Although I don't blame you. Hammond was the best."

"_Maybe, sir, but… well, working for General Landry has really made me respect you on an even higher level…" _

"I've heard that absence makes the heart grow fonder. And you know, the grass is always cleaner…"

"_Greener." _

"That was a joke."

"_Right. Good one. Sorry, sir." _

"Look, I picked Landry myself. He's a good man."

"_I know he is, but… it's just not the same. He's not doing as good a job as you did and he has no interpersonal skills. Nobody can relate to him at all, not even his own daughter…" _

"Give the man a fair chance to settle in. He's been overwhelmed with a huge problem just after taking over command. Be patient."

"_Yes, sir." _

"You know, you can ease up on the 'sir' stuff even though we're both supposed to be on duty right now."

"_Habit, sir, nothing I can do about it. Look, I know you're really busy, but I just wanted to… to tell you how much I enjoyed serving under you. And… that I'__d jump at the chance to do it again." _

Jack couldn't help but smirk at that. It sounded so dirty… even though he was fairly certain that wasn't how it was intended. Maybe he just had a dirty mind. Or he had been by himself in DC _waaaaaaaay _too long.

"Well…" he finally answered in a practiced neutral tone. "We might be able to make some sort of arrangement that we could all be happy with. Although according to Landry you're indispensable so I don't think he's going to be willing to let you go very easily. And… I can't say I disagree with his opinion of you so I don't want to make any promises…"

"_Oh crap, the General's back from the commissary. I gotta go." _

The connection was hastily terminated. Jack stared at the phone in his hand for a few moments and shook his head. How had he garnered such devotion, with all he had put the guy through last year? Hank must be having even more fun with the little guy than Jack had. Even though he was speaking to a dial tone now, he said, "Goodbye, Walter" as he hung up the phone.

The end.

A/N: Anybody guess who was on the phone, or did you think it was somebody else?


	2. Merging

Summary: Jack and Daniel on the phone after "Ripple Effect."

A/N: Deluded shipper rationale for "Ripple Effect," so spoilers abound. I jotted this down and wasn't going to bother posting it, then I remembered I had another 'phone call' story up already, so I just decided to make this the next chapter of it, in case some people want a way to explain the whole thing to themselves like I did...

Okay, so I had two shipper-friendly theories for the weird Sam, Martouf, Kvasir scene. Since there were tons of Carters around, she had a substitute in that scene. If it was the black uniform one that turned out to be quasi-evil, then the comment her Teal'c made to our Daniel about her being on her honeymoon was referencing Pete, since her dad didn't die in that reality... So, she's not quite so fond of Petey and didn't much mind about kissing Martouf. OR, the way this story takes it, it was just one of the remaining 17 Carters. That's how I kept my little shipper bubble in tact, in case anybody else needed help with theirs. ;). Mwaha. Take that SG1 directors. Okay, I obviously need sleep...

Merging

"So… let me get this straight," Major General Jack O'Neill said, leaning on his desk with both elbows, cradling the phone loosely to his ear. "You're saying while I was stuck in meetings with babbling idiots trying to explain the situation there to me and only confusing me more, then leaving them to go to meetings where accountants bore me to death with budget reports for the Atlantis laundry-detergent supply and God-knows what else, you were hanging out with not one, not two, not one and a robot, or one and an evil Replicator duplicate, but _eighteen _Carters?"

"Yup," Daniel answered succinctly from the other end of the phone. "Well, nineteen, actually, counting ours." He paused for a moment and couldn't help but add, "Jealous?"

"That you've come alarmingly close to living a recurring dream of mine for some time… yes."

"Ew, Jack. Come on, please. That's… way too much information. Speaking of which, Teal'c and I sort of tried to take a poll of sorts, just to satisfy our own curiosity, of course."

"What are you talking about?"

"Well, the last two times we encountered alternate realities, you guys were engaged or married, so we asked around and…"

"Daniel."

"Jack."

"Daniel."

"What? Even in the one where Martouf came to the SGC to be with her, they eventually broke up and now Janet said she's off on maternity leave with…"

"Daniel, why are you so fascinated by… wait, I heard about the doc, but _Martouf? _HE was there too?"

"Yes… why?"

"Ohforcryinoutloud," Jack muttered to himself.

"What?" Daniel prodded.

"Don't you think it's a little odd that all of a sudden, as soon as we… I mean as soon as I was promoted and moved, all these old guys start popping up everywhere you guys turn? I mean, Agent Barrett was one thing, that's understandable, I suppose, but Orlin was ascended, gone, poof, off floating around with the other glowing squids, and now Martouf? He's been dead for years, but oh no, a Martouf from an alternate reality just has to pop in to say hi…"

"Jack."

"Don't stop me, Danny boy, I'm on a roll. Anybody else nobody's mentioned yet? Let's see, did Narim somehow magically survive his planet being annihilated by the Goa'uld? Anybody been pulled over for speeding by Pete Shanahan or bump into that alien prisoner creep?"

"Um, Jack," Daniel interrupted again. "First of all, Agent Barrett did ask Sam out again and she turned him down, pretty cold. Secondly, Orlin was _a child _when he came back, and he's now little more than a vegetable because of the sacrifice he made to come help us. But even if he had been a grown man again it wouldn't have made any difference. And Martouf… well, I don't know all that happened there, but after spending a little time with him, Sam let one of her other… selves play stand-in for a while so she could get some sleep, so even though, yes, she was glad to see him again, I really think that had more to do with the fact that in our reality, she was forced to _kill _him than anything else. And anyway, I think you're missing the bigger picture here, which is one thing I get reminded of every time we encounter alternate realities, but particularly this time because there were so many…"

"What?"

"That even if you decide that the status of your relationship in other realities is of no concern to you, you have to at least look at the patterns established in _this _reality."

"And what patterns might those be, oh wise one?"

"People on the base used to joke about Sam being fatal to anybody who so much as thought about dating her, right?"

"Yeah."

"While I objected to that for many reasons, obviously, because she's my friend, it was a pointless claim anyway because you always liked her more than anybody and you're still around, so…"

"Daniel," Jack warned.

"Right. Sorry. Back to what I was saying. Anyway, I may not have liked the way they said it, but they did have a point, you have to admit. She did have a string of… unfortunate luck, with men. Not that my own was any better. With women, I mean, not with… you get it."

"Yes. Daniel, while I do occasionally miss you, I do not miss the part where it takes you ten years to get to a point."

"Gee, thanks. What I'm saying is, Pete didn't die. I think a big reason why that relationship progressed so far was that she was sort of amazed that he was still around. Not that she consciously understood the connection, but… anyway. She ended that relationship on her own because there was nothing wrong with Pete except for the fact that he wasn't you. And, I know I've always been the more optimistic of the two of us but if I were you I'd be pretty pleased with the way things have been lately. Yes, some old, at one point… potential romantic interests have resurfaced, and yes, some have come back from the dead to do it, but… don't you get it? She's no more interested in them in that way than she was when they were dead. What I'm _trying _to get through your thick skull is that… despite what Sam claims about there being an infinite number of choices and possibilities and all that stuff… all of _her _roads seem to eventually lead to you."

Jack was quiet for a few moments, then he said, "So… how much blue jell-o does it take to keep 19 Samantha Carter's happy?"

Daniel laughed. "From the way the guys in the mess was complaining… a lot."

Jack chuckled.

"Well, I really should finish my report on all of this…" Daniel hinted. Jack, who had never been much of a talker, was getting worse and worse about keeping them all on the phone talking about whatever he could think of the longer he was in Washington. Daniel knew he missed them all, missed being _home, _and tried to be patient, but there was only so much… smiling, Daniel decided to ask something that had been bugging him since black-uniform-Teal'c had mentioned it. "I have a question for you, actually."

"Shoot."

"Well, when the first team came through, the ones who started this. I was interviewing their Teal'c and he said something to me that I haven't been able to shake."

"You and Teal'c are together in his world?" Jack guessed.

"Very funny. No. We were trying to figure out where the realities differed and where they were the same… we gave it up after the first few teams came through, but anyway. He said their Sam came back to SG-1 after her honeymoon."

"And?"

"And, well, since Jacob was still alive in their world, I thought maybe she went ahead and married Pete there, since I'm still a little vague on all the stuff that happened while I was… trying to ascend. Anyway, that turned out not to be it, so of course I asked the next question and got the usual answer: you."

"So there's another one, so what?"

"Well, I started thinking," Daniel continued. "I assumed that was another spot where our realities were different but what if it was really just another point of convergence?"

"Daniel…" Jack started quickly.

"Sam was gone for a long time. We met you at the cabin and left you there, she reported to Area 51 two weeks later, and you were both terrible about returning phone calls and e-mails the entire time she was gone from the SGC. Jack, did you guys…"

"Goodbye, Daniel," Jack said firmly, hanging up the phone.

He waited a few moments to make sure Daniel wasn't about to call him right back, then picked up the phone and pressed another button. He strummed his fingers along the desk impatiently while he waited for it to be answered.

"Hello?"

"Where are you?" he asked quickly.

"At home… why?"

"Good, that gives you a little more time. Daniel's going to call you in about two seconds… or show up as soon as he can if you don't answer the phone, and by the way, don't answer the phone."

"Why? What's going on?"

"I think we may have just sprung the proverbial leak."

vvvvvvvvv


End file.
